Catherine Clark joins the GrowCFO to talk about imposter syndrome. Its a problem that Catherine encounters with lots of her mentees. Its something quite common amongst first time CFOs and its something she suffered from herself in her first role as a CFO. In this podcast Catherine gives you some great strategies for coping with imposter syndrome.

What is Imposter Syndrome?

You are in the role that you always wanted, so why do you feel like you don’t deserve it?

What are you thinking right now in relation to your intelligence, skills, or competence? If you’re feeling unworthy in some way, consumed with self-doubt. You may be thinking, ‘I got here by luck’, ‘I just work harder’, ‘I am not really good enough to be here in this role’. The chances are you are feeling like an imposter, and doubting your ability to repeat past successes.

Imposter syndrome is a problem worth sharing

And one worth solving. Because it takes so much emotional energy to deal with the feelings of not being good enough. Lower emotional energy will drain your ability to show up in the way you wish to. It will affect your confidence, productivity, motivation, and influence and ultimately stem your potential to be the best you can be in work and in life.

When you feel like an imposter, there is a gap between how others see you and how you feel inside. You attribute your success to external factors outside of yourself, rather than learning to feel like you have worked hard to deserve your role or the praise and recognition by others. Do you have an underlying fear of being found out? ‘I am not the person others think I am’, I don’t deserve this!’.

Imposter syndrome can arise from social conditioning, self-critical thinking, and family patterning. You may have been brought up to doubt your own self-worth in some way or be in a work environment that promotes self-doubt.

It’s normal to feel this way. You are not alone if you have these thoughts. Research shows that the majority of people feel like an imposter at some point in their life. The feelings can be there all the time, or they can come and go.

Self-awareness is the first step to combat imposter syndrome

The thoughts we are having in life affect our emotions, our bodily sensations, and our behaviours.

I’m going to get straight to the answer, you can change how you think. Despite having around 60,000 thoughts a day, we are not our thoughts! Meditation is one practice that is very helpful in allowing us to sit in the present moment and objectively observe our thoughts without reacting to them.

In the case of imposter syndrome, you may be in a big important meeting and a thought, ‘I am not as good as my colleagues’ emerges. You are likely to feel anxious or worried. Your heart may beat faster. You may feel butterflies in your stomach. You may blush if asked a direct question. As a result, you may withdraw inwards and not speak up with your insight or concern. You may be afraid to ask the questions you would like an answer to. It is often the emotion we notice first, and it is the strength of the emotion that can determine how much you believe the thought.

But imagine if these automatic negative thoughts, often arising from our underlying core beliefs and assumptions and attitudes did not emerge, or if they do you would be able to reframe them? Think how much better you would feel.

We can catch our thoughts and choose to react to them in a different way.